Thursday, May 22, 2008

A New Teaser from "The Accidental Murderer."

It's a slow news day, so here's some more literary filler.

Paddy didn’t seem to be paying attention, but he was. He also noticed that the guy up the bar had tightened up when Joe walked by, his shoulders had come up and he’d hunched forward a little. After the door closed, he straightened back up, reached for a cigarette, and ordered a shot. Everything in the bar was very quiet and normal.

Outside the bar, Joe and the couple had turned left and gone a short distance to the couple’s car. They said their goodbyes and the couple got in and left. Joe turned back the other way and walked a little further down the block.

At the bar, the man had finished his cigarette and after a little while he said he was leaving, his friend said he’d stay for a while, play some pool. Through the door, he stopped a minute to breathe the night air thinking, this shit has got to stop. He couldn’t think of a way out of it, though. Maybe leave town, but where would he go? How was he supposed to know they’d been told the amount of the money down to the penny?

“Oh, fuck it,” he said under his breath. He turned down the block to where his car was parked.

Paddy gave him about five minutes before he stood up, collected some of his change, said goodbye to his friend and quietly went out the door. He turned to the right and walked a short distance. He came to an ally, narrow, too narrow for a car. There were garbage cans standing near the sidewalk, Joe was in there too. Paddy didn’t really stop, just slowed down a little. Joe gave him a thumbs up, and he kept going until he got to the car of the man who had been a little nervous in the bar, which he opened with a set of keys and climbed into.

Paddy backed up the few car lengths and aimed the trunk of the car into the mouth of the ally. He got out, went around and opened the trunk. “Grab his feet,” Joe said, as he reached down and took the man by the shoulders.

“Is he dead?”

“If he ain’t, he’ll be dead soon.”

They placed the man in the trunk and both climbed into the car. “Pull around the corner here and stop a minute.” Joe took the keys and went to open the trunk. He reached into his right coat pocket and took out a pair of thin, leather gloves, and he reached into his left coat pocket and took out a kitchen sized plastic trash bag and a roll of tape. He pushed up one of the man’s eyelids and in the dim light he saw that the pupil had completed its work here on earth. He gently raised the mans head and placed the bag over it, securing it around the neck with the tape.

3 comments:

Anonymous
said...

Fiction is not my cup of tea. There's so much of it, and too little time. You're a good writer, why don't you write about what you know? A memoir, perhaps. "The Life & Times of Fred, the Reformed Lawyer, or My Dangerous Life in College Point & Points East."

I might, the memoir that is, but I've wanted to write this book for years. It's about people who live completely removed from ordinary reality. I knew a lot of them in the Seventies, people who made outside livings and if you asked them, how about that Patty Hurst? they'd say, as a woman friend said to me one time, Patty Who? I don't suppose many people will read it, I'm writing it because I want to. Go back and look at the other teasers, if you would be so kind.

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About Me

Mr. C is: a reformed lawyer; a religious atheist; a useful "Handy Man;" an amateur social scientist; a beloved teacher; a well liked husband and father; Ambassador Emeritus from, and to, Planet X; a freelance professor; taxi driver to the stars (Joe DiMaggio and Ronald McDonald, both out of uniform); an excellent fire fighter; an enthusiastic but untalented musician; an experienced counselor; a top-notch disk jockey; an all around get-along-guy; a cunning linguist; a would-be lifestyle victim; a Masonic wannabe; a frequent reader; Professor Irwin Corey's Ph.D. adviser; an accomplished driver and motorcyclist; a famous rockologist; a reliable but indifferent bullshit detective; a poor speller; a proud United States Navy veteran (honorably discharged, barely); the Ayatollah of Ass-o-Hola; a drug legend; a Returned Peace Corps volunteer (Thailand); a generally charming man; nationally and internationally known from coast to coast; a legend in his own mind; a cultural-anthropological critic-at-large; an avenging angel who coolly bides his time; Soul Brother number 37; and a friend to the poor.